Heres a little marketing info

[biebs]

Since there is always alot of talk about advertising here, I thought I would pass this along.

Boating Magazine, the largest boating publication in the world (paid subscribers) is 90 pages this month and saddle stitched. For those who understand the print world, when you go to being saddle stitched that says alot when your a large high gloss pub. 90 pages? I know of some regional high gloss marine pubs that have not dropped below 100. When looking at print media, paid subscribers means a great deal. When a reader pays for a pub they are more likely to read it then a freebie.

Whats this mean, economy sucks? Of course. Some can say they are putting more money into the web, not really. We have all seen what is going on. If you look at the national base of marine companies they have dropped most of their campaigns by 70%. Some have dropped completely some have cut the sizes of there ads. When they say web, its more of websites then web marketing.

My father who was in the publishing world for over 30 years taught me one thing that I always remember.

Do you know what happens when you don't advertise?

Nothing. Nothing happens.

What a great time for some companies who have a little cash flow to pick up some market share.

Crazy.

[TheBigI]

I am a marketing major and one thing I learned is there is no way to make a correlation between advertising and increased sales.

[biebs]

Explain further?

I personally can pinpoint direct sales to certain advertising efforts, down to the penny.

For instance, I advertise specific products in specific media related to a marine product that is used by the state parks and recreation. I can attribute exact purchases to specific advertising avenues.

Another example. Squidnation advertises squids on sportfishermen.com. Someone clicks on his ad banner and buys squids. He can see where that purchase came from and how it started and ended. Seems pretty simple to me for tracking where he advertised and how the sale came to be.

Not being a smart ass, just a little confused with your thought.

[TheBigI]

The true definition of advertising is a paid for ad in print,TV or radio it does not offer any sort of discounts or promotional offers. If that occurs it is no longer considered advertising The main goal of advertising is to create brand awareness or deliver a message. A lot of execs will become angry with their advertising team if immediate results are not seen, which is not the goal of advertising. If a company is looking for immediate increases in profits it would be much better off using sales promos and other tools.

A lot of companies have switched over from advertising into different forms of marketing. That is why big ad firms have switched to full service marketing, offering a variety of different methods. This is called IMC or Integrated Marketing Communications.

[TheBigI]

I forgot to mention a banner ad on a website is not considered advertising.

[Jer]

TheBigI, branding is only part of advertising. A banner on a website can be used for branding and it is advertising.

If you are a retailer and you buy an ad (print, TV, radio, online, etc) to advertise products, thats advertising.

A bank may have an ad for car insurance. That ad would probably not be used for branding, but that would still be advertising. If well done, it will convert.

[Squidnation]

Very intersting comments. Not sure where to start. Lets go with Brand awareness and the idea that a banner ad is not advertising. For the first year of squidnation.com I only advertised on Sportfisherman.com I ran a genaric ad that just said the company name and what products we offered. Now I also had my signature at the bottom of all my posts. I also had a square ad on the side of the page. None of these areas carried promotions or discounts. But each carried a unique url that tracked hits to my website. To go a step further I could track how much each hit generated. For example (totally hypothetical) I can tell you that top banners generated 400 hits a month but signature hits only generated 300 hits a month but 12 sales for $2,000. Side banners would genererate 150 hits a month but only 8 sales. Like I said totally made up numbers but I can track to the area that they hit and what it generated. Now here is the coolest part. I started getting calls and sales from google etc. I would ask the guys where they heard of us from. Well, lets see - Sportfishing Magazine, Canyon Runner seminar booth, Marlin Magazine and one ever said a tv ad on OLN (which is now versus). You guessed it. I have never ever adevertised in any of the media but I bet they saw my banner on Sf.com and just associated offshore fishing, products, sf.com, mags they read and next thing you know we gained brand awareness. I would also venture to say that not only does a site like this make great sense for brand awareness but also brand loyality. I liken it to nascar. Nascar fans are very brand loyal to the companies that put their stickers on their cars. So are sf.com members

Well we branched out and started advertising on print and the sales and places where people heard of us grew. This all from paid advertising. We just recently added promotional and discounted items to the banners and they have been effective as well.

I certainly do agree with you that IMC is much more effective then just puchasing an ad on a site or in a newspaper. But that is nothing more then common sense. At least it is to me. The more you say your name, show your name, write your name, sell your name, talk about your name, wear your name, sing your name, joke about your name, Piss your name in the snow, spoof your name on youtube, have girls wear bikinis and put your squids inbetween their boobs and video tape it, walk into harborside at midnight and throw 12 inch squid on the bar, think your name, or cyber your name, hell finger paint your name on a foggy window - the more people are going to see your name. You never know where you'll a rasta squid or the squidnation logo. Hell you may even turn on The today show tomorrow morning and see a rasta squid.

BTW - I graduated with a marketing degree. But I damn sure didn't get taught about the reaction and brand recognition I would get when I walked into harborside at midnight and put that squid on the bar People remeber that type of marketing. Those are called real life educational moments!

[TheBigI]

Good stuff, I may be wrong about banner ads being advertising and not something else. I have emailed my old advertising professor about it. When he replies back I will let you know his take on the subject. He isn't just some professor with no real world experience. He was an advertising exec for many years.

[neilinov]

Good stuff, I may be wrong about banner ads being advertising and not something else. I have emailed my old advertising professor about it. When he replies back I will let you know his take on the subject. He isn't just some professor with no real world experience. He was an advertising exec for many years.

You said the key word there OLD! When you put up ads everywhere you generate awareness. When you put them up on the web you can track everything right to the sale. It is a much more efficient way of finding out how your ad dollars are spent.

[biebs]

Many business people are aware of the famous example of Post and Kellogg’s companies in the 1920-30s: When the Depression began they about equal in cereal sales. Post slashed their advertising while Kellogg’s maintained theirs. By the end of the depression Kellogg’s had opened a market share dominance that they have maintained to this day.

I think one would be hard pressed to find a successful business person who doesn’t believe advertising is necessary to increase sales...there is a reason that the top companies in any given market have a advertising and marketing presence.